There’s a danger that someone who tries to be everything to everyone – a country crooner for Mary-Lou, a rocker for Sadie – ends up meaning not much to anybody. So while Adams’ post Whiskeytown affairs have been inconsistent in terms of style and quality, Cold Roses is a return to the form that made him famous.
With the backing of The Cardinals, acoustic tracks like ‘When Will You Come Back Home?’ and ‘Friends’ see Adams connect sensitively with his music, in a humbled and passionate way that Damien Rice fans will already be familiar with.
But the sheer magnificence of his quiet numbers mean the fast forward button is all too tempting when we get to the barn dance. ‘Beautiful Sorta’ and ‘Dance All Night’, with the twangy geetar and visualisations of bad mullets, wade too deep into Texas territory for his transatlantic, properly coiffed fans to relate to.
Regrettably, the biggest gripe is prompted by a basic schoolboy error. Ryan here doesn’t do himself any favours by making this a double album – it’s inevitably drawn out, which causes otherwise strong songs like ‘Rosebud’ to be buried in the musical avalanche. But a bit of manual editing on your iPod could boil this down to Adams’ strongest 50 minutes for a long time.